Firestorm 6.4.5—EEP Public Beta!

by

It’s Here Folks Finally! But In Public Beta Release..

EEP—Linden Lab’s Environmental Enhancement Project—is here.  The EEP Firestorm viewer is now available as a public beta viewer. Linden Lab is hoping to get feedback from our user community and the Firestorm team highly encourages you to file bug reports on LL’s Jira here.

Before you ask, this is NOT a required update. It is a beta viewer and will not count against Firestorm’s 3-available-versions rule. You do NOT have to uninstall your current Firestorm, and in fact we suggest that you keep it. The beta viewer will install alongside your existing Firestorm on a separate channel (on Windows).

Download the viewer here: Firestorm EEP! Beta Downloads.

About EEP

As many of you know, Linden Lab’s Environmental Enhancement Project has been in the works for a long time and reached the grid in 2019. While the official SL viewer has had EEP for a few months, Firestorm has been working to eliminate bugs in our own implementation and streamline/improve the interface. While we don’t feel that EEP is ready for full release—in fact, it has not passed our QA yet—Linden Lab wants all SL users to have access to it, and many of you have been clamoring to use it.

EEP is a new environmental lighting system, a change from the previous Windlight system. Sky, Water, and Day Cycle settings are now saved as inventory items (assets), and can be created, copied, transferred, or sold the same as other inventory assets.  EEP settings can be applied to the land by parcel or region owners, or to yourself as personal settings visible only to you. 

With EEP,  

  • You can use your own sun, moon, and cloud textures.
  • You can customize the length of the day (yes—you can now have 24-hour day cycles!).
  • You can set different skies at various levels on your land. 
  • Visitors to your parcel will be able to see all your customized settings.
  • You can import your old Windlights as EEP settings (many have already been imported).

Note: Windlight still works in viewers 6.3.9 and older, with a few bugs due to server changes.

For additional information:

Additional Viewer Features

 This viewer also includes

  • LL’s new cam controls with the ability to create camera presets.
  • Updated viewer translations in many languages

See https://wiki.firestormviewer.org/fs_645_prerelease for the full list of new features.

Bug Fixes

Even though it hasn’t been long since we released Firestorm 6.3.9, this one comes with a lot of bug fixes. Below is a list of just a few key things we feel folks will appreciate. For a more thorough list, please see our 6.4.5 PRE-RELEASE NOTES.

  • A fix for the AO crash in Firestorm 6.3.9.
  • A fix for Macs affected by MacOS – Blur When HiDPI Support Option Not Used https://jira.firestormviewer.org/browse/FIRE-24311.
  • A fix for skin failing to load for Bakes on Mesh while editing shape.
  • A fix for attachments to dismissed notices going to trash.

Known Issues

As an entirely new environmental system, EEP still has bugs to be worked out. You may see strange lighting glitches. Some have experienced reduced FPS. We hope that everyone trying this beta viewer will review the list of known issues and file bug reports to help us improve the viewer for you.

Downloads

Download the viewer here: Firestorm EEP! Beta Downloads.

OpenSim

For OpenSim users, there are 3 key points:

  • The viewer incorporates Windlight <—> EEP interoperability, allowing EEP viewer users to visit legacy Windlight regions.
  • The viewer supports the new OpenSim 0.9.2 with EEP—code-named “Ugly Sky.”
  • There is now a fast-entry grid feature on the login screen—simply enter a URI to add a new grid.

In addition, our last OpenSim Release had a bug that caused crashes when rezzing items. This bug was responsible for 70% of all reported FS OpenSim crashes on the 6.3.9 version, and it has been fixed.

Have a good one from all of us at Zoha Islands And Fruit Islands